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| Shari Saunders of Virginia |
Shari
Christine Saunders, 67, of Norfolk, Va. was last seen on video surveillance
footage buying gas at the Shell-Marathon gas station at Exit 93 on Interstate
Highway 65 in Evergreen on Aug. 5, 2018. Saunders, who was traveling to visit
relatives in the Monroeville area, never arrived at her destination, and her
car was eventually found on Aug. 13, 2018, abandoned on a dirt road off Canaan
Church Road in southwestern Conecuh County, not far from the county’s borders
with Escambia and Monroe counties.
Despite a
widespread search for Saunders, including a nationwide missing persons
bulletin, multiple law enforcement agencies, search helicopters and tracking
dogs, Saunders was not found. For over two years, investigators continued to
search for Saunders, interview sources of information, and follow up on leads
and information that came in on a weekly basis, Brock said.
On Dec. 26, 2020,
hunters found unidentified skeletal remains in a wooded area off a gated,
private road that intersects with Canaan Church Road. Those remains, which were
found in Conecuh County, were submitted for forensic testing in hopes of a
positive identification, Brock said. The discovery of the remains was kept
confidential until a positive identification could be made and a next of kin
notified, Brock said.
On Friday, Brock
announced that a forensic laboratory had positively identified the skeletal
remains as those of Shari Saunders. Additional evidence is being evaluated by
other forensic labs, and the Sheriff’s Offices in Conecuh, Monroe and Escambia
counties are focusing on particular suspects. Brock noted that Saunders’ cause
of death remains under investigation.
“We
would like to thank the community for their willingness to help in bringing
this case closer to being solved and ask that you report anything that might be
of evidentiary value,” Brock said.
Anyone
with additional information to provide to investigators, is asked to call the
Escambia County Sheriff’s Office at 251-809-0741 and ask for Investigator Smith,
who is spearheading the investigation.
Saunders disappeared while making
her fourth trip to the Monroeville area, and family members said that the last
contact they had with Saunders was at 5:44 a.m. on Aug. 4, 2018 when she called
from about 20 miles east of Columbia, S.C. During previous trips to
Monroeville, Saunders would customarily call family members when she exited
I-65 at Evergreen’s Exit 93. Family members, who live south of Monroeville,
would then meet Saunders at the Minute Stop gas station at the intersection of
U.S. Highway 84 and State Highway 21 at Ollie. Family members said that none of
the family ever received a call from Saunders on Aug. 5, saying that she was at
Exit 93, so none of the family went to meet her at Ollie.
Law enforcement
officers began searching for Saunders on Aug. 6, just hours after she
disappeared after leaving the Shell-Marathon gas station at Exit 93 in
Evergreen. During the investigation, it was determined that she last used her
credit card at the gas station and when investigators checked surveillance
footage from that location, they watched as Saunders pulled into the parking
lot just after 1 a.m. Saunders entered the station at 1:08 a.m., and she pulled
out of the parking lot a few minutes later, turning left and heading west on
U.S. Highway 84, towards Monroeville.
Her whereabouts
remained unknown until the skeletal remains were positively identified last
week.
